// Category Archive for: Music

No Shame In Flamboyance: An Interview With Gere Fennelly

Interviewed by Less Lee Moore

One of the coolest live performances I ever saw was in Dallas TX in 1993. Redd Kross was playing with a bunch of other bands (including pre-indie-cred Nick Heyward from Haircut 100) for the Live 105 Acoustic Christmas.

For their cover of PJ Harvey’s “Oh My Lover,” keyboard player and pianist extraordinaire Gere Fennelly performed the song on a baby grand, with singer Jeff McDonald dramatically sprawled on top of it.

Although she left Redd Kross soon after to concentrate on other pursuits, that amazing flair for theatricality and humor still infuses everything she does.
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Glitter and Doom: Tom Waits

Fox Theatre, St. Louis MO
June 26, 2008

By J Howell

Despite Tom Waits’ assured permanent status on my short list of heroes, I have mixed emotions about the St. Louis Glitter and Doom show. It’s not that it wasn’t awesome; I’m pretty sure that Mr. Waits is quite incapable of playing a bad show at this point. It’s not that his band was less than aces; they were, to a man, amazing musicians. . .
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The First Synthpop Song, Part One

By Less Lee Moore

Read Part Two here.
Read Part Three here.

Although I usually consider the search for the Pop Culture Holy Grail to be a quest for a tangible object, this time around it was something more esoteric.
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Jane’s Addiction, Nothing’s Shocking

By Christian Lipski

Nothing’s Shocking is a great example of an album that I liked more for the individual statement that those specific songs made than the band itself. I didn’t really follow Jane’s Addiction after their debut, and I never felt sad about that. What I do feel sad about is that I looked on my iPod and I do not have this album on it. Okay now I do.
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Adventures with Metal Mania: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

By Ann Clarke

I recently re-subscribed to cable TV after a three-year hiatus. There is crap on TV that I am completely out of touch with, but that’s probably a good thing. In that three-year break, I didn’t pull that shit where people claim to only “read books” just so they can one-up the rest of the world. That’s just as bad as the douchebag that watches Ultimate Fighting Championship.
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They Are All, So Don’t Even Try: NXNE 2008 with Redd Kross

By Less Lee Moore

You have to understand. . .

There are things that I look forward to, things that I get excited about, and things that I Live For. Redd Kross is one of the latter.
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It Has To Be From The Heart: Firewater

By Ann Clarke

Beachland Ballroom, Cleveland OH
May 30, 2008

Photo © Julie Finley

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The Police, Synchronicity

By Jemiah Jefferson

This is the first music that I ever bought in a record store (or, I should say, that I begged my mom to buy for me—I had absolutely no money of my own at the age of eleven, since I never got an allowance as a child. . . or a teenager, for that matter). I bought this on cassette, probably from a Sam Goody or something similar, in a mall. I bought it months after its release, in the fall, after a punishing summer where “Every Breath You Take” kept its stranglehold on the Billboard #1 slot for what seemed like forever. I have always quite disliked that song, and after seeing so many other worthy songs attempt to break through and fail (most particularly “Is There Something I Should Know?”, Duran Duran’s vastly superior single, which topped out at #4, much to my rage and frustration) I learned to hate it, and I still hate it.
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A Conversation With The Cowsills

By Mandy Mullins and Jaime Sparrowhawk
(with lots of help from Paul Cowsill!)

Susan, Paul, and Bob Cowsill

The Cowsills are one of the foremost musical families in pop history. Brothers Barry, Bill, Bob, and John formed the group in 1965. Joined by their mother, Barbara (a.k.a. “Mini-Mom”), they recorded their self-titled debut album in 1967 and achieved their first hit, “The Rain, The Park and Other Things” (#2). A short time later, brother Paul and sister Susan (the youngest Cowsill) rounded out the lineup. With unparalleled harmonies soaring above an infectious bubblegum beat, The Cowsills went on to release a slew of LPs and singles, including the top ten hits “Indian Lake” (#10, 1968) and “Hair” (#2, 1969), and served as the inspiration for the popular television show The Partridge Family before disbanding in 1972.
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54-40 Has Northern Soul: Q & A with Neil Osborne

By Megashaun

There are few Canadian bands who have been around as long as 54-40, and few who remain as consistently active. And as with many bands who’ve been around for any significant amount of time, they’ve gone through a few minor line-up (and wardrobe) changes. Their style, however, remains the same. While each 54-40 record has its own vibe, the songs are at their core heartfelt and sincere if not a little tongue-in-cheek from time to time.
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